1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a file management system, method and a computer program, and more particularly relates to the retention and management of telephone call record files generated in a call center and an office and files of images captured by a monitor camera and so forth.
2. Description of the Related Art
The files of telephone call records (voices) occurring in the call center, the office of a sales department or the like, or the files of images of persons, background video images and so forth captured by a monitor camera and so forth (hereinafter, referred to as a “record file” or “record files”) are retained in a file management device as records incidental to various activities. For example, when the record file of telephone calls is to be retained and managed, information relating to specification of a phone number (or information such as an IP address or the like with which a connecting destination is identified), date and time of acquisition (that the file has been acquired), or a place of acquisition, such as the information of identifying an object to be acquired, information on a situation upon acquisition and so forth are retained in the file management device as attribute information by relating them to the record file concerned. In general, the record file is stored in a storage in the file management device and the attribute information is stored in a database which is under the control of the file management device by being related to the storage, that is, a storage location that the record file has been stored. The attribute information is used by searching the database later when the record file is to be referred to or as required.
It is desirable to install the storage at a secure location, that is, the storage of the record file is in a place such as a data center or the like where the files are readily managed collectively from the viewpoint of insuring security. Therefore, it becomes inevitable to transmit the record files from the call center (having a file collection device) that collects the record files to the file management device installed in a remote location over a network.
As related art of this kind, for example, in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2010-219734, there is described a telephone call records central management system where voice files and attribute files of the voice files generated in offices which are decentralized such as sales offices, branch offices and so forth are transmitted to a central management server over a network such as a WAN (Wide Area Network) or the like and are registered in the database of the central management server so as to unitarily manage them.
However, since the capacity of the record file is large, such a disadvantage occurs that in a method that every time one record file is created on the side of the file collection device, the record file is transferred to the file management device, an amount of the network bandwidth to be used for file transfer is large and a delay is induced in transfer of other pieces of data which are high in priority. For measures, in which the transfer of record files occurs, there is conceivable a method of transferring the record files collectively in a time zone where room in the network bandwidth is available such as in the nighttime. Therefore, in the file collection device, we can think of a method of retaining collected record files in a storage until they are transmitted to the file management device and transmitting the record files to the file management device when there is room in the network.
In the unitary telephone call records central management system described in Japanese Patent laid-Open No. 2010-219734, if the record files and their attribute files which are collected and retained by a local server are collectively transferred from the local server to a central management server by utilizing a time zone that there is room in the network, the load which is imposed on the network for file transfer will be reduced. However, since many record files and attribute files are retained in the local servers in the decentralized offices until the record files and the attribute files are transferred to and collectively retained in the central management server, it is difficult to refer to them unitarily.
As a solution to the above-mentioned disadvantage, there is also conceivable, for example, a method that every time one record file is acquired by each local server, the record file is transferred to the central management server. However, in this method, since the frequency of file transfer in the on-duty time zone in the daytime that many record files are acquired is high it is difficult to transfer the files by selecting a time zone where the network load is small. Furthermore, there is a demand that searches can be conducted over a wide area by using attribute information, and that a desired record file can be obtained rapidly.